Chapter 39: This roommate is eighteen years old
Just like Yu Xiaoli said, let’s not talk about anything else first, just sit down and eat and fill our stomachs.
From noon to afternoon, the food was still hot, a steamed sea bass, a portion of braised pork with bean curd sheets, stir-fried loofah with edamame, fish-flavored eggplant, and a big bowl of leek and egg soup.
But the sea bass had a long knife wound on its body, running from the top of its head to its tail, for some unknown reason.
Lu Wei sat uncomfortably at the table, and Yu Xiaoli put a large piece of braised pork in her bowl.
"Xiao Lu, try it. Xiao Da is the only one who usually eats the food I cook and always praises everything I cook. Can you help me criticize it a little?"
Lu Wei nodded quickly: "It's delicious, delicious. Teacher Yu made it really delicious."
Zhai Da coughed dryly: "Why don't you pick up the chopsticks first?"
I've given you the script, but you still can't act well?
Lu Wei almost buried her head in the bowl: "O...li...here..."
Fortunately, Xiaoli's enthusiasm can melt all the awkwardness. She never lets words fall on the floor at the dinner table, and never lets Lu Wei's mouth be idle, always piling food into the bowl.
Zhai Da was much more normal and just ate his meal by himself.
Lu Wei was eating home-cooked meals that she hadn't tasted for a long time. Her cheeks felt sore, and the soreness went all the way to her eye sockets. Fortunately, her eye sockets had always been red, so it wasn't so noticeable.
After eating most of the meal, Yu Xiaoli said, "Xiao Lu, I heard Xiao Da about your situation. I just asked the people at the factory, and they said there are no vacancies in the dormitory over there."
Lu Wei raised her head, put her chopsticks back on the edge of the bowl, and placed her hands on her knees.
"You know, they send people here for internships a few months before they graduate from technical secondary schools. The first batch will arrive next week. They've even cleared two meeting rooms so they can sleep on the floor."
Lu Wei quickly said, "Teacher Yu, I can sleep on the floor too. I don't have much stuff."
Yu Xiaoli glared at her reproachfully: "The students sleeping on the floor are all boys, why are you sleeping on the floor?"
"Then... I can deal with it in the workshop first..."
Zhai Da didn't say a word and continued to clean the sea bass on the plate.
You know what, it tastes even better after being cut.
Yu Xiaoli's ulterior motive became clear: "Listen to me, on your way back, I will clean up the storage room next to Xiaoda's. You can stay at my house first. When you have made up your mind and recovered, you can move out later."
Zhai Da came to his senses, sat up straight and looked around, but didn't see any debris.
"Where are the things in your storage room?"
"I'll put it in your room."
Zhai Da glared and asked, "How can you fit so many things in there?"
He immediately stood up and was about to go see it, but Yu Xiaoli pulled him back: "Don't go, it will make you upset."
Zhai Da:?
He expected that Ms. Yu would open her mouth and let
Lu Wei moved into the house, but unexpectedly, she had already started cleaning the room.
On the way back, she even had time to cook a meal...
Sure enough, middle-aged women are all numerically weird...
Lu Wei lowered her head and said in a soft voice, "Teacher Yu... there's really no need..."
Even though Zhai Da had already taken precautions, and even though Yu Xiaoli was enthusiastic and warm, it was still not easy to make such a decision.
Accepting help from others is harder than doing it yourself.
Sometimes, rejecting kindness is just a conditioned reflex of those who fall into the water.
Lu Wei looked at Zhai Da, trying to get some help, or to hear Zhai Da persuade her to agree, or even to persuade her not to stay.
But Zhai Da didn't react at all. He supported his head with one hand and concentrated on cleaning up the leftovers.
Some things have to be decided by Lu Wei herself.
The brief silence stretched on, and finally, Lu Wei mustered up the courage to say, "Well...thank you, Teacher Yu. I'll bother you for a few days. I can pay for the rent and food..."
Yu Xiaoli's expectant expression brightened in an instant. "It's all a small matter, not about money. That sister Ma from our factory quarreled with her husband every day when she was young. She also came to sleep in my place every few days, but she never paid me. This room isn't part of the factory. What will happen if one more person lives there and wears it out?"
Zhai Da nodded. He remembered Aunt Ma Cuilian when he was in elementary school. She often checked in with her luggage and cried with Yu Xiaoli all night. The longest time she stayed was a week.
To be honest, it was a bit unkind to talk to Ms. Yu about these things.
Later he stopped coming.
My spouse passed away due to a stroke. From then on, I gave myself flowers, rode my horse freely, and danced square dance until two in the morning without anyone caring.
Now that the results had been discussed, Yu Xiaoli began to make arrangements in a hurry.
In the end, Zhai Da washed the dishes. Lu Wei wanted to do it for her, but was pulled away by Yu Xiaoli. The two of them had to go and clean up the storage room. There was a lot of cleaning and washing work to do.
The things in the storage room were not piled up in Zhai Da's house in the end, but were placed on the balcony, which was originally a place people could walk around in, but was now completely sealed off.
After finishing the work, it was already past ten o'clock. Yu Xiaoli took care of the guests and asked Lu Wei to take a shower first.
Lu Wei was almost dazed as she was pushed into an unfamiliar bathroom, carrying her toiletries in her hands.
I started to stare at the mirror.
What to do next...undress?
There are two toothbrush holders on the sink, one green and one pink, they should belong to Zhai Da and Teacher Yu.
It's easy to identify, but not because of the color, but because the toothbrush inside the green one exploded like weeds.
Lu Wei took out her own...orange plastic cup from the plastic bag, which was smaller and simpler.
Like one of those cheap beer glasses you see in cheap restaurants, or maybe even what it was.
Finally, carefully, it was placed side by side with the other two.
But soon, Lu Wei took back the tooth cup as if she had been electrocuted, as if she had done something terribly wrong.
I secretly decided to keep my things in the storage room from now on, even if they were in plastic bags, and never take them out.
She didn't want to disturb other people's lives...even though she had already disturbed them, the less the better.
Lu Wei was at a loss, but worried about occupying the bathroom for too long, so she forced herself to overcome the strange feeling of unfamiliarity and take off her clothes first.
Just as she took off her shirt, there was a knock on the bathroom door. Lu Wei was so scared that she quickly put it back on: "I'll be right out."
Outside the door, Yu Xiaoli said softly, "I'm not rushing you. I found you a bath towel. The hair dryer is in the drawer under the sink. I'll tell you."
After taking a nervous shower, Lu Wei didn't even dare to dry her hair completely before she hurried out. Yu Xiaoli seemed to be slapping her face in her room, while Zhai Da's door was closed.
With half-wet hair, Lu Wei returned to her room like a thief.
This is not a specially designed storage room. Zhai Da's house is over 60 square meters without any public area, which is not much different from the 80 square meters of a commercial house. It can be called a second bedroom, after all, there is a window.
But for more than ten years, it was just the mother and son who lived in the small house, and it gradually became a place to store miscellaneous items.
A spring folding bed was placed in the rectangular space, taking up a small half of it. Yu Xiaoli said she would ask if anyone had a single bed they didn't want anymore. Lu Wei naturally objected, but her objection was ineffective.
On the side was a row of cabinets, half of which was cleared out for Lu Wei to put her things in, while her suitcase was spread out in the corner.
The spring bed was already covered with bedding, all from Zhai Da's family, and there was even a pillowcase embroidered with a retro mandarin duck pattern.
Lu Wei was in a daze for a while. With nothing to do, she chose to lie down quietly so as not to cause trouble to others.
She just lay there flat on the creaky folding bed.
The moonlight shone through the narrow window onto Lu Wei's slender bluish-white legs. Even though they were just ordinary shorts, they looked a little hollow against her legs, like two big trumpets.
Occasionally, there were sounds of footsteps outside the door. It seemed that Yu Xiaoli and Zhai Da had gone to take a shower one after another. Every time someone passed by, she became particularly stiff.
I kept thinking in my mind whether I had left anything in the bathroom or made anything dirty.
I lay there for two hours and didn't fall asleep until one in the morning.
Until a clear voice sounded.
"Can't sleep?"
Lu Wei woke up in a second and looked at the wall beside her in shock.
"Zhai...Zhai Da?"
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